"Did you ever hear of Ægles?"
Repellier had not.
"Well, according to that old Greek myth, Mr. Repellier, Ægles was a wrestler. He was born dumb, they say, and hadn't ever uttered a word in all his life. But one day in the arena he saw an athlete resort to some piece of dishonest trickery—I can't remember just what it was. Then, in his passion to denounce that trickery, he broke the strings of his tongue, and suddenly spoke."
CHAPTER XXI
THE SIGNS OF BLIGHT
Some love your songs, but I who know
The happier touch of lips whence flow
These notes that all men turn to praise
Loved you, the singer, all my days;
And longing, listening, loving, I
Have waited till the song should die—
Till you, the singer, came to bless
My lips with your own lips' caress.
John Hartley, "The Silent Hour."
Amid all his chaff were phrases that got down the neck of one's memory and tickled like barley-beards.—"The Silver Poppy."